Question-and-Answer Session
Operator
(Operator Instructions) Our first question comes from Omar Saad - Credit Suisse First Boston.
Omar Saad - Credit Suisse First Boston
Congratulations guys on a great quarter when a lot of these consumers thoughts are dropping like flies lately.
Mike and Joe, I wondered if you could help us understand how you’ve been able to improve value positions of consumers because that seems to be having a great impact on your business holding up so well on top of the fact that the category is generally a more stable category. But in an inflationary environment, how have you been able to improve that kind of proposition to the consumer where they feel like they’re getting great value for the products given w hat’s happened and what we’re hearing is happening on the inflation side?
Joseph Pacifico
As we said, we began over a year ago looking at how we were positioned in the market, price competitiveness and we felt definitely OshKosh needed more work than the Carter’s brand but there was one area of Carter’s we needed. So we focused on that as an organization, we looked at every one of our core products and we re-engineered these products to match benefits to what the consumer is willing to pay in the market, and it has really paid off. Our results in the third quarter are beyond our expectations for both brands but really the total organization focusing on a few items and getting them in line with what needed to be in the market, and it’s worked well for us.
Michael D. Casey
I think companies who have a strong value message are doing well in this market, and Carter’s for a long time has had a very compelling value message and terrific product, good price. That hasn’t been the case with OshKosh until recently. So one of the good things that we’ve learned over the years with Carter’s and in recent years with OshKosh, we started to implement into the OshKosh product offering. To Joe’s point, our performance is largely a reflection of a lot of hard work over the past year or more to strengthen our product offering across all business segments.
Omar Saad - Credit Suisse First Boston
Switching gears a little bit, in your wholesale business are you seeing any trends with competitive brands. This environment is very [inaudible] these smaller companies. Are you seeing any shifts in terms of private label becoming more or less prominent in this environment?
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